I can't tell you how many times I have uttered that phrase over the years. What was it that kept so many interested in Burning Image for so long?

Burning Image arose out of the ashes of a group called "The Pictures". Tony Bonanno and I formed "The Pictures" as an excuse to play the cool edgy music of the day and to bring Punk Rock to Bakersfield, CA. We were tired of playing all the crap from the radio. We also wanted to play our own music. We were not alone.

At that same time, Joe Sparks and Paul Burch were in a local band playing X and Bowie tunes and wanting to create their own homegrown musical revolution. "No more Dinosaur Rock" was our battle cry. It was fate that brought us together. Tony and I finally decided that Joe and Paul should be in our band. After a meeting over sirloin tips and coffee at Denny's it was final. Burning Image was a band.

Burning Image was formed in the summer of 1983. A wide range of music, art and fashion influenced us. Our tastes ranged from Killing Joke to Christian Death and Andy Warhol to Edward Gorey. Politics, religion, and personal angst were perfect topics for the songs that we were writing. We wrote a bunch of cool tunes, did some shows with Dead Kennedys, 45 Grave, Specimen, Butthole Surfers, and Dr. Timothy Leary, just to name a few. We put out a 7" single with the songs "The Final Conflict" and "Burning Image, Burning". We worked our asses off. It was great.

Over the years we would get inquiries about Burning Image. People asking about the 7" single or if we were going to release any old Burning Image material or if Burning Image was still around. I would see the 7" single being sold on the internet and see it hanging on the wall of some indie record store.

Which brings me to this project. We felt that the time was right to put together this collection of Burning Image music and finally let the unreleased material have its day in the sun. This will give everybody that was already familiar with Burning Image the chance to listen to stuff they've never heard and let the new generation of Burning IMage fans discover what we were all about. We hope that you have as much fun listening to this CD as we had putting it together.